Shayne Wells, Chris Egert and Katie Steiner wake me from my drunken stupor

I'm up in the morning before the local 9 a.m. chat fests begin, but I rarely turn on the TV. 

Tuesday morning, however, I couldn't miss the new battle royal going on between three of our local stations. As noted last night, channels, 4, 5 and 9 all want me to care what their highly educated, intelligent reporters and anchors think. Or at least listen to their boring interviews with fitness experts. 

I flipped between the stations for more than an hour, and found a mixed bag. 

Let's start with the granddaddy of superfluous chat, Fox 9. Now calling their morning fluff "Good Day," the gabbing trio swapped out the jolly weatherman for the roving reporter. It was a lot of the same, or so it seemed. Some of the same regular guests are sure to return, like their longtime favorite, that garden guy I have zero interest in, ever. Old Alix Kendall was outside the studio chatting him up on the "new" show for day 1. 

So what's new? I think they have a new musical ditty for the show. I didn't pay close attention. They definitely have a new set. Instead of sitting around the table, the women sit in extra tall chairs, as if they're trying to give you an "up skirt" peek. I don't get why that's a good choice. At one point there was an awkward camera shot of Alix , as if they haven't figured out the angles for the solo shots of the talking heads perched high above the floor. 

There are also new social media handles, of course, because the hour has a new name. Alix, the lone survivor of the "Good Day Minnesota" program that launched in 1999 spoke to the former name of the morning news fest, and claiming that the new program is paying homage to the first version of the morning news presentation. I believe she also suggested that the old Good Day Minnesota program was a little less news intensive overall, as the rebranded Buzz hour will be. Quite a bombshell you dropped there, Alix. 

Perhaps more relevant, "Good Day" is a tag that Fox likes to drop on local programming around the country. Seems like the Fox 9 program is simply following corporate branding in 2021, for what that's worth. 

Alix did talk about a clip of the old 1999 program at one point, which showed the original foursome. Last I knew, Tim Sherno, Robin Wolfram and Mary Alice Rosko no longer work in TV. Not a shock. We know Sherno has bounced around for years since leaving Ch. 5, his home after Fox 9. Rosko left TV to reinvent herself, she claimed, and did some travelling and blogging for a year or so, then needed a paycheck and is now a media contact for a nonprofit organization (I assume it's nonprofit).

The clip was a fun flashback. Your hair was much darker in 1999, Alix. 

Most of the program was otherwise forgettable, as it should be. They still fluff up Buzz Boy's 10 a.m. talker minutes before it begins. They all slapped each other on the back. Jason Matheson is starting his seventh year as a little league talk show host. Oh boy!

I didn't see all of the program because I flipped back and forth between the competitors. 

On Ch. 4, Mr. Forehead Jason DeRusha was holding court, as usual. His usual sidekick, Heather Brown, was absent, so third wheel Shayla Reaves held court with Mr. Foodie. She was hired in December 2020, evidently. Was she a direct replacement for Kim Johnson? I don't know. We also lost Ali Lucia last year, and since I can barely stomach DeRusha, I almost never turn on CBS in the morning. I'm skeptical they ever replaced the traffic reporter position when Lucia left. So I'm guessing Reaves is a 1-for-2 hire, but I can't prove that. 

The one thing I remember from my brief glimpses at Ch. 4 on Tuesday, they still bring in one of the reporters to contribute to an intellectually stimulating conversation. I doubt they had one, but I assume that's the goal. Today it was Katie Steiner, the fourth-string meteorologist. Or is she fifth-string? Hard to say. But rather than all sit on the couch together, Steiner was in an office, or somewhere else outside the studio, so they could do that magical split-screen banter between her and the co-hosts. Yawn. 

Over at Ch. 5, they rolled out a lackluster "Minnesota Live" show. It's weak, but at least they're trying something different. Seems like that's the perennial goal for Ch. 5. 

Hosts Megan Newquist and Chris Egert run a similar gab fest, from a set that looks like it was discarded by a cable access studio. I heard them give the mandatory speech telling me what the show is, and they introduced a revolutionary element to the show. You can share your photos with KSTP, and they may be featured on the show! 

It all sounds uninspired, but I will note that they are doing something distinct. The show is broadcast in Rochester and Duluth, as well, and they'll be using reporters from their sister stations in those areas to bring general interest segments to viewers in all three markets. Sure, Fox 9 could send a reporter to Duluth to preview some fall festival, which interests me none, but there's interesting potential for this chat fest that will set it apart. Points for that. 

I did see moments of some sort of health and/or fitness segment on Ch. 5. I didn't hear any disclaimers about it being a sponsored segment, and I have no idea if they had a disclaimer at the end of the show, but KSTP's first day health/wellness segment sure looked like a sponsored segment. Not a crime, of course, but one of many reasons I dislike these faux news shows. 

And there was a segment where Egert and Newquist brought out the show director or producer. Whatever her job is, she discussed the grand vision and they answered all our burning questions. Oh thank God, Twin Cities Live isn't going away. It's a sister show to the new Minnesota Live! They had flashbacks to the early years of TCL, too, as if that was relevant somehow. And they sure think highly of TCL. I'm glad somebody does. 

Ch. 5 launched an overall lackluster program, but there's potential. Lord knows there's room for growth. 

I read some tweets today. Somebody claimed that while Egert and Newquist are still anchoring news from 5:30-7, or something like that, they no longer fill 7-9 on Ch. 45, or kick off the morning at 4:30. Not sure if that means another set of staffers fill those gaps, or if Ch. 5 dropped them. I'll take a look soon enough. I'm sure you're dying to know the answer if you don't already. 

And I saw a celebratory tweet from Fox 9. They had a celebratory moment after their first Good Day program, as if they had just worked for months to open a new craft brewery in an abandoned Minneapolis warehouse. I don't care how much planning when into the rebranding, that's all it was. Try to keep it in perspective. But it's TV, those folks never miss an opportunity to slap themselves on the back. 

I stuck with Ch. 9 at 10 a.m. to see the kick off of what's year 7 of Jason Matheson's amateur hour. I see glimpses of it now and then, as Fox likes to run the show two or three times a day between its stations. It's always unimpressive and minor league in its style and substance. It's less focused on local talkers, and somehow the show is carried in other cities. I haven't seen a list of which cities, but a station in Seattle has nothing better to show than an hour of Matheson fawning over his favorite TV shows and sharing his inside Hollywood gossip that can only be gleaned by a talking head in Minnesota. 

The fact that a station Seattle is now carrying his gab fest as of this fall boggles my mind. 

Yes, I'm still retired. Several times per year I find something worth writing about, but I can't bring myself to do it on a regular basis. You never know when Jeff Dubay will be arrested next, or when Keith Leventhal will get a new job, prompting me to get off the couch. But yes, I'm still retired. 

I had a premonition Kim Johnson was fired by WCCO

I'm not making this up, I swear.

I haven't been watching as much morning news, lately, thanks to the fact I am not working these days. It's temporary, and I'm not too worried about it. 

Turns out I could have morning coffee with Kim Johnson these days. 

I have no idea why, but this past weekend I wondered about Kim. As I watched local news coverage of the "peaceful" protests, and saw a cavalcade of WCCO reporters chipping in to the coverage, I wondered about Kim. I have no idea why, but I realized I haven't seen her lately, and I wondered, for no reason, if she was still working at WCCO.

Why did I have a premonition about Kim, and not Ali Lucia, Alix Kendall or Chris Egert? I don't know. (I saw Alix not too long ago, but I haven't turned the TV on much in the morning, do Ali and Chris still have a job?)

Then I read this morning that the morning anchorette, who never seemed to work a night or weekend, who never seemed to be called upon to do anything extra, was out of a job. 

Turns out she's one of us, I learned today. I never knew that. I did know, for no particular reason, that she's married and spends a lot of time frolicking around Lake Minnetonka. The story I stumbled upon somewhere suggested that she lives on the lake. 

I don't know what's more puzzling, why she had the job as a morning anchorette, seemingly for years, or why WCCO was compelled to kick her to the curb.

I have to wonder if she was shitcanned simply because WCCO is desperate to trim salary from the books. I gotta believe ad revenue is way down at this point in the pandemic. They've gotta be cutting deals on local commercial time, don't they? 

Great theory, but I can't imagine she was a financial burden. I have a few other theories that are even more of a stretch than that.

I suspect the end result of her unceremonious dismissal, whatever the motivation, is that we won't see a new hire. Instead her seat in the early morning will be filled by somebody on staff. I can imagine several ways this might work. 

Whatever the end result, I'll miss her, for no good reason. There's a reason, but it's not a good one. 

Now if WCCO really wanted to unload dead weight, it would have dumped Liz Collin. 

Jason Matheson must have a drug addiction

As Jeff Dubay's broadcasting career ended with a spectacular thud last month, another bastion of Twin Cities broadcasting perseverance made a splash too. Just not as big of a splash. And that's the way it should be.

Jason Matheson, a local entertainment guru, is returning to local television at Ch. 4, where Don Shelby once famously proclaimed in a commercial, "We all really like each other," or something close to that.

I've seen Matheson now and again over the years, and as best I know, he worked in some capacity, perhaps as an intern, for Ch. 4 prior to his long tenure at Ch. 9, our local Fox affiliate.

Years ago he was known as Buzz Boy, a doughy, young looking, enthusiastic entertainment reporter. Over the years he grew up to be a fixture for Fox9. He did his "Buzz Boy" weekly entertainment show, participated in the cheesy coffee talk hour the station created in lieu of another nationally fed male-female gab fest to follow the hard hitting news of the 8 a.m. hour and anchored a little news in the wee hours of the morning before the stars of the morning news took over the anchor desk.

And somewhere along the way he added chick talk radio co-hosting to his resume. After a long morning in Eden Prairie he drove to the Hubbard compound in St. Paul for girl talk. Sorry Jason, I haven't listened to more than 15 minutes of your radio career, so for all I know you could have been talking politics all day.

The dude wasn't building houses, but he was putting in long hours five days a week. As we're seeing here in the Twin Cities, radio, TV and newspaper gurus are double dipping whenever they can. Again, a topic for another night.

Matheson left Fox9 a little over a year ago, unable to get paid what he so richly deserved for wearing multiple hats on a daily basis. That coincided with his move to morning drive radio.

For a year he has sat on the television sidelines, presumably because of a non-compete clause in that fat contract from Fox9, and talked the talk on the FM dial. A little over a year later and we get the big news that Matheson is taking his talents to downtown Minneapolis.

I was mildly surprised.

Our little afternoon male-female gab fest on the Hubbard TV station was in need of a new male anchor last spring. The era of the housewife may be a novelty of the past, but the show is geared toward a female audience, now more than ever. When "Twin Cities Live" lost its testosterone in John Hanson around the same time as Matheson was readying to leave Fox9, Twin Cities Live gave up any pretense that the show was for a mixed audience. Yes, men enjoy "food, fashion and fun," or however they bill it, but it's clearly a show geared toward women, and perhaps gay men.

Because of that non-compete, I suppose, Matheson was unable to take the male reigns of TCL last spring. So KSTP poached one of its news guys to fill that void. That guy, who is so forgettable I've practically forgotten his name, conveniently left the show less than a year later to take a seat at the morning news desk. It was as if Chris Egert (see, I remember,) was filling the seat on a temporary basis until Matheson could legally fill it. And given that Matheson was already drawing his paycheck from the Hubbard empire doing morning drive on chick talk radio, it seemed like an almost perfect marriage. Even gossip maven Cheryl Johnson thought so when Matheson was preparing to leave Fox9.

And then Matheson sold his soul to his original Twin Cities mistress, Ch. 4.

I was mildly surprised, but not completely. Had he taken the male throne of TCL, it would have meant starting work before sunrise and sticking around until 4 p.m. daily. For the right money, I'm sure he'd have said yes. But he was pretty much stuck in morning drive on the radio, as TCL's cheerleader, Elizabeth Ries, is already double dipping at Hubbard, filling the morning slot after Matheson.

So Matheson is off to Ch. 4 and TCL is still looking for a man that loves food, fashion and fun.

The gossip maven claimed that multiple stations were clamoring for Matheson's talents. I'm not sure why he's such a hot commodity, but clearly he is.

There's value in familiarity, so Matheson has that going for him. And while his love of entertainment and coffee talk are not my cup of tea, there's a need for that in local television. Our country has never been more obsessed with celebrities and the millions of non-celebrities that are vying for 15 minutes, and if you want to draw viewers to your station's local news programming, you'd better be able to shill for the network's entertainment offerings. Death, taxes, gun control, those are news topics to some. For others, you'd better talk about American Idol, a Kardashian sister or Lady Gaga's current concert tour.

And there's Matheson to cash in on it.

Who knows, perhaps they'll actually have him do news reports on non-celebrity topics, but I'm guessing that a station that employs Heather Brown to go out and ask people for a "good question" on a nightly basis isn't a station that is hiring Matheson for his coverage of Hennepin County District Court proceedings.

We will soon find out.

I'm not a fan of Matheson. I'm not that interested in pop culture topics, or the opinions of TV reporters, anchors and/or meteorologists when it comes to current events and pop culture.

Despite that, I find it hard to dislike the guy. Like his good friend Jeff Dubay, Matheson has worked hard to build a career in broadcasting covering topics that he seems to love. Unlike Dubay, Matheson hasn't derailed his career or lashed out against the online negativity that lurks in dark, and no-so-dark, corners of the Internet, as far as I know.

I'm not his target audience, but obviously I've seen his stuff more than a few times on Fox9. He went from a doughy, slightly awkward entertainment reporter to a polished broadcasting professional. I may not enjoy his work, but I admire the hell out of his work ethic and professionalism.

And about that professionalism. I think if there's anything I can criticize him for, he has been professional to a fault.

Did I mention Matheson is gay? I don't know where I first heard mention of it, but it probably wasn't by Matheson. Unlike some local "celebrities," (talk show hosts, anchors and reporters are not celebrities,) Matheson doesn't need to appear on the cover of our local gay periodical three times a year, as far as I know. I don't think he hides the fact that he is gay, but just like his non-gay counterparts who don't need to vomit tidbits about their personal life, Matheson avoids it too, as best as I can tell.

Years ago a KSTP reporter and fill-in anchor use to drop harmless little references to the fact he was Jewish. I don't care what religion an anchor or reporter is. Likewise, I really don't care if a reporter or meteorologist is gay. Yet it use to bug me that when the coffee talk hour would feature stories about gay issues, Matheson seemed to be going out of his way not to reference his life or his experiences during the dialogue. Yes, I eventually caught him making a reference to his own life, but it seemed to take a long time.

On the one hand, I couldn't care less what religion or sexual orientation a reporter or meteorologist is. On the other hand, if you're going to engage in on-air coffee talk, and share opinions about the topics of the day (because it's important to know what Alix Kendall thinks about current events,) then doesn't it look curious when you don't share personal experiences about news topics that you probably can relate to during your life?

I can argue that he was too professional while sitting on the Fox9 couch, but there's no rule that says he has to cut open a vein when giving an opinion about current events or pop culture nonsense.

And that's the only thing I can find to criticize him for.

I've never met the man, I never will. I don't listen to him on the radio, and I'm not going to start. I likely won't be fascinated by the topics he covers for Ch. 4, but I'll get a chance to see his work occasionally, and I'll probably watch it.

He's good at what he does. Very good. Plenty of public figures on radio and TV in the Twin Cities rub me the wrong way. But Matheson isn't one of them. There's nothing to dislike about him.

So why must he have a drug addiction? He must be hooked on some sort of stimulant, because there's no way the guy can log that many hours week after week simply on the strength of a good night's sleep. The man might be a machine.